BPD Wife Wants Divorce and is Ruining Her Life

[Portent]

Hi All,

Its been a turbulent month almost to the day. I knew my marriage was in trouble. After the birth of our son my wife was dissociating with me I knew that and she was on a long trip to Ireland for a conference. We had a bad fight a week before she left and she had made a veiled threat to leave me to which I responded with my own threat. She has been abusive towards my step-son and I commented along the lines of 'do you think I'm going to let you treat our son like you treat *****' I didn't know at the time because I didn't recognize the BPD but that one comment basically was the final nail in the coffin.

She left for Ireland and there was a shift early on in her trip in her texts and calls. Calls ceased and text became transactional. She stopped saying 'I love you.' I knew when she left that she would break one way of the other and I knew which way she had broken. She wouldn't tell me when she was coming back or what flight. She had driven herself to the airport. Something she had been doing a lot of on trips recently. Something I didn't notice but do now.She came in gave me a hug and we went upstairs.

She gave me the speech. Here are the finer points.

I cant keep pretending.

I dont love you anymore.

I'm having an affair.

I want a divorce.

There is no way to fix this because I've made up my mind.

I was in shock not for the wanting a divorce I saw that coming but the affair and no desire what so ever to fix our relationship. I didn't know what to say. I got her to agree to go counseling but that has proven to be a totally disingenuous gesture.

But its not the wanting a divorce its all I've seen since.

When we were dating she told me that she was bipolar. We had agreed that if she had another episode we would get help. I had been trying but she refused to go. She still refuses to go. But as time has gone on I really think she was misdiagnosed and what is really at the root is BPD.  She put me on a pedestal. She idolized me when we were dating and first married. When our son was born I didn't live up to her expectations. I was a first time dad. This was her third kid. She knew way more than I did and she became very very controlling. She stated to deny love as a means of controlling me and forcing me to be a better father but all it was doing was driving us apart. She has a natural controlling ego.

Things started to totally fall apart after a trip to South Carolina. We took my mom so she could help and my wife and I could reconnect. It didn't work out that way. She hovered around our son the entire time and wouldn't let my mom help at all. She would sit in the back seat while I drove despite my mom constantly offering to be win the back with the kid. My wife would not give up control. I see now that she was just using our son as an excuse to keep from reconnecting with me. I see now that she uses her children as weapons.

After South Carolina is when she began her affair. The guy is a fat week tool. He is married with 5 kids. My wife pressured him not the other way around. He tried to break the whole thing off but my wife broke him down. Now his family is in turmoil since his wife found out. I think his eldest son is depressed and suicidal over the whole thing but my wife has blocked out all emotion about it. She has said to her ex-husband 'I dont care about XXXX kids. He made his own choice.' Things are going poorly with him and her now and its making her worse. He is on the verge of breaking it off so she is pulling out all the stops.

I was giving her space but things have gotten really weird and I now know that she is BPD and its the root cause of all of this. On thanksgiving I managed to get through to her heart again. We talked like we used to. The walls were down. As she was leaving I told her not to go and to stay with me. She told me she wanted to say but she had promised XXX that she would go. And she left. The next day her texts were all messed up. Massive guilt over everything she had done to me to xxx, to his family. But she came back soulless again.

Fast forward to her birthday. Just before her birthday she had another business trip. It was a two night trip or so she said. She was supposed to leave at midnight on Wednesday and come back on her birthday. The day before she changed her schedule. Now she was leaving in the middle of the day. Understand that I cant be home on Wednesdays until late so I had to have my mom watch our son. My mom says the came in for about an hour fixed him dinner and left complaining about being late for her flight.

We texted and even had some good texts while she was gone. The morning of her birthday I'm in therapy and I get a text. She tells me that she is home and that she will be staying home with the kids so I can go out. Understand that for days she had insisted that she was going out on her birthday. And I knew that meant out with xxx. Now she wasn't. I tell her that I'm not leaving her on her birthday. I know that something has happened. Eventually I got the lowdown from friends I've been in contact with. XXX's wife knows where he is living now and drove buy. It has snowed for 2 straight days and there were no tracks meaning no one had been in or out. I latter found out that she did leave on the trip for only a day. She didn't leave on Wednesday. She left the day of the meeting and came back the same day. She basically abondoned both our kids and her other two kids (it was supposed to be her week with the kids) so she could be with xxx. His wife knocks on the door and he answers with my wife there. There is a huge blow up because he had wanted the kids that weekend, presumably to introduce them to her. Apparently he had told her a month ago that it was over between him and my wife and he was living away just for time to think. She tells him that if she introduces the kids it is over and she is taking the kids.

This is where my wife gets really crazy. Later that day there is a change of plans. She will be home with the kids at around 5. I call her ex because I know what is happening. She is going to introduce them to xxx. He texts her to reaffirm their agreement. She is to leave the kids the hell out of this. Understand that they share custody and agreements on the welfare of the children are part of the custody agreement since they agreed to keep the kids out of it this would be a violation of the custody agreement. She assures him that she is not. So they get home and had been at a restaurant. The ex-calls and my step daughter answers the phone. Sure enough they had met xxx. I know what my wife is doing. XXX wife laid out exactly what she needed to do. My wife doesn't want to be a step mother to 5 kids who hate her. She doesn't want his ex or his kids in her life. So if she can use her kids to put pressure on him he can cause him to lose his kids and get his wife to leave the state. She is using her own kids as a weapon. And she knows it could cost her custody.

XXX is getting cold feet and chooses to stay with his family that night. Now I know my wife. XXX might think that she is okay with missing her birthday. I know better. I actually thought if he missed her birthday it would be game over and it might still be. Now things get even weirder. Over the next two days we reconnect, with alchol involved. First we have a serious discussion about her giving us a second chance. Then she shifts and decides that she wants to have a sexual relationship while she continues to see xxx presumably so she can make up her damn mind. Then she backs out of that because she is totally guilty. She cant hurt xxx and she has done such bad things to his family, and out family etc. etc. etc. This is when I began to suspect that there was more involved here than bipolar mania.

We had another fight because she told me that XXX wife had told him that he was depressed and suicidal. I agreed that he might be, she didn't know him and he looks like a depressed alcoholic. I actually know that he is but I cant tell her everything. Apparently he is so bad that at one time last year he was supposed to be watching his two youngest kids and instead passed out drunk on the couch. His family came home to find the 1 and 3 year-old playing in the unfenced front hard next to the road and him passed out. So I was most certainly going to take any opportunity I had to make my wife question his quality as a husband and father. He has convinced her that he is a great father, husband, handyman because she spent months venting to him about me so he told her everything she wanted to hear. I know its all a lie. You can look at his wife's Facebook page and know its all a lie. There are very few pictures of him with his family. He looks like a lazy neglectful alcoholic because he is.

Now my wife is pissed at me again for taking him off of his pedestal and not talking to me. All the ground I gained over her birthday is lost. But there is more too it that. Its how I realized that she is BPD. She has intense guilt over what the has done. When I get through to her and reach her heart her guilt is even greater than her feelings for me. She cant take it so she runs away. When she comes back she has found some reason to shut me out.

I started reading about BPD. When I brought it up with her ex he said that a family friend who was a Dr. had once suggested that she might be BPD. Now after reading the information on it I'm convinced of it. I think the bipolar was a misdiagnoses. Her mood swings are too rapid. Lots of wheels have been turning in my head about this about what caused it. She doesn't talk about her step father much. Her story is that he made sexual advances towards her when she was a teen. She went to her mother and her mother sided with him. I dont believe that story anymore. I think its only a half truth. I think he was abusing her from a very early age. I think that she only got the courage to confront her mother when she was a teen. Deep down inside she feels responsible for the abuse. A child would rather take responsibility than confront the fact that those who were supposed to care for you and protect you abused and neglected you. When a loved one molests a child it is not done through force but through manipulation.  That is why my wife has to be the seducer as is the case with xxx. It makes her the one in control. She was manipulated so she has to be the manipulator. With me it was reversed. I came after her. I seduced her. At some deep level the probably associates me with her step father.

This goes way beyond our own relationship now. She has been growing more and more abusive to her older son. There is a great deal of misandry, man hate, in her BPD because it was her step father who abused her. Her anger is directed at the men she loves in her life. I know that as time goes on it will be directed at our son if she doesn't get help.

I've agreed to stay in the house until our son is at least 3. But I'm waffling on our agreement on custody. I've seen how much she respects such an agreement with her ex and how she will use her children as weapons. I have to get through to her and get her in therapy. Or what is happening to my step son will happen to my son. I know she still loves me too. I see it when I get through to her heart. But now I'm far more concerned for the rest of my family.

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members may appear frustrated but they are here for constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[drained1996]

Hello Portent, you certainly have had a lot going on in life lately.  That's a common theme you will find in the stories of others here as well.  It can be very overwhelming dealing with the world of a BPD as their realities are often distorted and we in turn get pulled into their turbulent world.  We can find ourselves emotionally, mentally and physically overwhelmed.  Does this sound like a familiar condition in your current life?

Whether your wife actually suffers from BPD or not is really not relevant at this juncture... .she certainly bears some traits which must be dealt with by you and everyone else.  One thing many here have learned is that you cannot change them, but you can change how you react to and communicate with them.  To the right of this page you will see some tools and lessons that can help you navigate in your process. 
All are very helpful, but I'm going to suggest you pay special attention to setting boundaries.  Boundaries are something we use for our own self protection if they are set so everyone knows the boundary, and that there are consequences when those boundaries are crossed.   
Have you thought of seeking our a therapist to help guide you in this journey?
Keep sharing, we are here.   

[Portent]

I am seeing a therapist. Ive been seeing the marriage councilor who aaw my wife and I. He refused to council both of us because my wife wouldnt call off the affair. But hos advice has been very helpful. He agrees that BPD is most likely correct and thst Im going to have to avoid conflict abd assuage her abandonment fears. Im reading up using the information here.

I dont know how much time I have though. I found out yesterday that everyone at her work might kniw so its a huge scandal thst could torpedo her career. I think one of the reasons she started this was to help her career. Having XXX wrapped around her finger is very advantageous but if everyone knows they will see her as using sex to climb the ladder.

[Portent]

Quick question, I know this will sound odd but Im torn on if I should let my wife know tgat anytime she wants it Im here. Im trying to drive a wedge between her and xxx. I know that the sex with him is bad and she is resorting to toys at home. I also think it would help reestablish my dominance. She started to withhold sex because I make her lose control. Im just mot sure if its a good idea though.

[drained1996]

should  I let my wife know that anytime she wants it I'm here... Im trying to drive a wedge between her and xxx

I would not suggest using sex as a manipulator in any fashion.  This pulls you down to being on their level... .and trust me they are better at manipulation than we could ever hope of being.  Do think that setting a boundary that you are not actually available for sex unless XXX is completely out of the picture would be a good idea for YOU? 

My suggestion is to let things run their course, educate yourself here and try using the communication suggestions and tools.  IF this begins to help things and you all get to a point organically where sex is welcome and wanted by both parties then that would seem the healthiest path. 

[Portent]

That is the current bpundry I have set. And I dont think she is better at manipulation than me. I was a bit blinded by love but now its war. My wife is very smart but not that smart. Im the one with a tattered dog eared copy of the prince not her.

[Portent]

And she wants sex badly. She is a kinesthetic person. A bad physical attachmemt to xxx is eating her up. That is why she wants me. The problem is I would be validating her bad behavior and giving her both worlds.

Still though I do hsve a great deal of power over her when the sec is regular. That is why it was yhe first thing she pulled away from as we started to cycle.

[drained1996]

The problem is I would be validating her bad behavior and giving her both worlds.

And you would be allowing her to break a boundary that YOU set... .

[Portent]

So can you not change a boundry?

[drained1996]

Portent, thought I would follow up and see what you are feeling today.  Also thought this link may be useful for you:

https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=287068.msg12704923#msg12704923

[Portent]

In feelibg okay. Bad things between my wife and xxx last night. They both found out that its all over the office. My wifes long term plan was for both of them to divorce and introduce themselves as a couple later but with this known it's now impossible to take that route.

And yes Ive read a lot of thr info. Im not through it all yet. In trying to affirm her and avoid the conflict she craves. But she still tries to pick fights. I just have to use verbal judo. She is still pissed at ne and not engaging but she talked to me a little last night. I should be able to make headway this coming week.

[Portent]

As for worrying about my wifes ability to manipulate, with the fog of love goggles removed she aint that good. My father was a brilliant bi-polar lawyer with a psychologicaly undergrad. My wife is an absolute amateur. That is why everyone at work found out. She is a horrible liar. She cant keep all the balls in the air and remember what lies she told last much less three lies ago. Inconsistencies are apparent with the truth easily read between the lines.

Like O said, she will pack a day bag and tell you she is going on a two night business trip. Rest assured I would have covered that detail were it my lie.

[Lunira]

Let me ask you something, in all seriousness... .Are you happy with the soap opera you have going on at home?

If so, then why are you complaining about it? 

If not, then why feed into it with manipulation and Machiavelli?

Moving forward, what do YOU want?  How do YOU want to live?

[Portent]

I want her in therapy.

She just lost any custody of her 2 oldest kids because she drove drunk with them to spite her ex-husband. Instead of taking responsibility she is blaming everyone else. Dr. Jeckle has shown up for about an hour and apologized for what she has done. Other than that one hour  Ms. Hyde has been in full control. Of course she has her full network of new friends who enable her.

I dont really care about our relationship anymore. I just want her to get help so she can be a mother to her kids. If she wants her 2 back and my cooperation she will be in therapy. Her first appointment is Monday. Her treatment brings back my wife maybe we can reconcile but that isnt my concern anymore.